Q: I'm growing some plants under
fluorescent lights inside this winter and also planning to start some others
from seed later. What is the ideal time the lights should be on a day?

A: Anywhere between 12 and 15 hours a
day is fine. I run mine 14 hours a day and use an automatic timer to turn them
on and off.

It's also a good
idea to use one warm and one cool bulb in each fixture to vary the spectrum.
It's still not as good as plant-specific "grow lights," but fluorescents are
fine for foliage plants and seedlings.

Turn the plants
every week or so to average out the differing light spectrums and intensities
in different parts of the bulbs.